Law practice is increasingly specialized, and Vanderbilt offers several well-established upper-level tracks that allow students to gain in-depth exposure to fast-evolving technical and complex areas of law.

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Vanderbilt’s Career Services program provides students with the resources and support they need to assess their strengths, explore career options, refine their career goals and launch successful legal careers.

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Most students find it important to balance the demands of legal studies by joining one or more organizations for professional advancement, personal development, community service and professional networking.

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Criminal Justice Program

Vanderbilt Law School's Criminal Justice Program offers an array of courses, seminars, and clinics for students interested in criminal law and procedure.

In addition to the first-year criminal law course, Vanderbilt's large criminal law faculty and adjunct faculty teaches over twenty courses in the second and third years that focus on criminal theory and practice, criminal procedure, juvenile justice, international criminal law, mental health law, and various other areas connected to criminal law. For a list of upper class courses and a sample registration, see our Academics page. The program also features academic roundtables and symposia aimed at exploring current legal scholarship on criminal justice issues.

Watch Criminal Justice Program Director Christopher Slobogin present "Contemporary Debates in Criminal Justice: Government Surveillance," as part of an online course designed to expose participants to the basic principles of criminal law and to constitutional doctrine governing the police and adjudication of crime:

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WATCH: The Vanderbilt Criminal Justice Program, the Law and Business Program, the Criminal Law Association, the Law and Business Society and retired DOJ Fraud Section Executive Deputy Chief John Arterberry ’73 welcomed Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Jesse Eisinger to the law school for a talk about his new book, The Chicken**** Club: Why the Justice Department Fails to Prosecute Executives, on October 17 to Flynn Auditorium.

Eisinger’s new book is a blistering account of corporate greed and impunity, and the reckless, often anemic response from the Department of Justice. Why were no bankers put in prison after the financial crisis of 2008? Why do CEOs seem to commit wrongdoing with impunity? The problem goes beyond banks deemed ‘Too Big to Fail’ to almost every large corporation in America—to pharmaceutical companies and auto manufacturers and beyond. The Chicken**** Club—an inside reference to prosecutors too scared of failure and too daunted by legal impediments to do their jobs—explains why.